Quarterly injections instead of HIV pills?

This is interesting, although it'll be a long way off before it becomes any kind of practicality. A big problem with current HIV treatment is that many people simply aren't good at taking pills regularly, day after day, for the rest of their lives. This of course leads to the HIV virus increasing in the blood if the antiretroviral meds are reduced in the blood. Which means there's a greater chance of the HIV virus mutating and becoming resistant to the medication (being poorly taken), introducing a whole new strain of HIV into the population that's is then resistant to those drugs. Today in fact there are rare strains of HIV that are resistant to all current HIV medication.

So in cases like that, it would surely improve things if a quarterly injection was used instead of daily pills.  

BOSTON — Researchers are reporting that injections of long-lasting AIDS drugs protected monkeys for weeks against infection, a finding that could lead to a major breakthrough in preventing the disease in humans. 

Two studies by different laboratory groups each found 100 percent protection in monkeys that got monthly injections of antiretroviral drugs, and there was evidence that a single shot every three months might work just as well. 

If the findings can be replicated in humans, they have the potential to overcome a major problem in AIDS prevention: that many people fail to take their antiretroviral pills regularly. 

A preliminary human trial is to start late this year, said Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr, an AIDS expert at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, but a larger trial that could lead to a treatment in humans may still be some years away. more